tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1658138279766595241.post7318452243734406357..comments2024-01-04T04:31:00.481-05:00Comments on Mixed Race America: The authenticity trapJenniferhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13261371053113519712noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1658138279766595241.post-83604396731809969002008-06-06T10:13:00.000-04:002008-06-06T10:13:00.000-04:00S-fizzle,Interesting that your mother changes the ...S-fizzle,<BR/>Interesting that your mother changes the way that people interact with you in these situations. Which just goes to show, that a lot of times it's all about context.Jenniferhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13261371053113519712noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1658138279766595241.post-2959155813954268482008-06-04T12:30:00.000-04:002008-06-04T12:30:00.000-04:00yeah i get the people that always assume I'm Chine...yeah i get the people that always assume I'm Chinese and fluent in Chinese. It's funny though Korean people are much more hesitant with me and speak to me in English all the time .......until they see my mother and they start rattling off in Korean.s-fizzlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17650977726578538866noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1658138279766595241.post-4036616856021454442008-06-02T10:44:00.000-04:002008-06-02T10:44:00.000-04:00Nicola & Sara no h,Thanks for your comments and ob...Nicola & Sara no h,<BR/>Thanks for your comments and observations. Nicola, I appreciate the different spin/perspective you have on dim sum. I freely admit that my own prickliness has to do with being back in SF for the first time in a while--being back in a place where there is a critical mass of Asian Americans and Chinese Americans. And then feeling like I'm being condescended to at a Chinese restaurant--when it was clear, since my cousin was speaking mandarin, that we were Chinese American.<BR/><BR/>I think that I do appreciate when I get an explanation at a restaurant when I'm not sure about the dish. But I didn't feel like I was getting an explanation so much as being "sold" on the dish. I can't quite explain it--I have been other places where dim sum ladies give the English explanation and it didn't rub me the wrong way--there was something else I thought was going on, and maybe I'm being oversensitive but I linked it to the fact that we were two Chinese women sitting with two white guys--we were a very conspicuous table at this restaurant, and one table with some younger Chinese/Chinese American teens/twenty-somethings were giving us the stink eye for a while. <BR/><BR/>And again, maybe this is my oversensitivity from being at UCSB and being called a banana and a sell out while walking with my white boyfriend, but I do feel like within the Asian/Asian American community there is a type of censure that happens towards Asian American women who date "out"--and especially who date white guys.<BR/><BR/>It's complicated--the inter-racial dating thing. And I can't ignore the ways I've absorbed media images and cultural values and therefore am complicit in some things.<BR/><BR/>Sara no h, I absolutely agree that getting mired in the checklist of authenticity is taxing and ultimately not helpful. I think that's why I wanted to write this post--to admit that as much as I KNOW that doing this is not productive, there's something seductive about doing it--something we (or at least I) find myself doing--evaluating "authenticity" in others, in myself. A losing proposition, I know, but one that I think is easy to fall into.Jenniferhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13261371053113519712noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1658138279766595241.post-31821207055138516552008-05-31T18:13:00.000-04:002008-05-31T18:13:00.000-04:00You know, I've struggled so much with the notion o...You know, I've struggled so much with the notion of an "authentic" identity - Pinay, for me - that I think I've really just burned myself out on the whole ordeal. I used to keep those kinds of checklists - +1 for knowing how to cook all of my family's traditional dishes, -1 for not speaking Tagalog, etc. - but it's just become more stressful than anything else. I can't help but think, <I>does it really matter</I>? My experience is real, regardless of whether it makes me more white or more Pinay, or some weird little <I>halo</I> hybrid, and I think I'm finally learning to be okay with that. <BR/><BR/>But I do appreciate it when the dim sum cart ladies (and yes, they're always women where we go too!) take the time to explain the various foodstuffs on offer - I can recognise anything that can be found in the frozen food aisle at our grocery (mostly mainstream stuff like shu mai and pork buns - and desserts, I can always recognise desserts), but everything else is, well, foreign to me. My white partner, on the other hand, is familiar with most of it because he goes there all the time ... and while I used to fret over the fact that he was clearly more "Asian" than me, now it's just - well at least <I>someone</I> can explain to me what I'm eating!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1658138279766595241.post-72689893422361278902008-05-31T08:54:00.000-04:002008-05-31T08:54:00.000-04:00I actually read the dim sum experience differently...I actually read the dim sum experience differently. I get frustrated and annoyed when someone assumes I speak Cantonese when I'm in my home town. Where I grew up I'd pick up the phone, say "hello?", and get yakked at in Cantonese by a political campaigner or someone trying to sell something because our family last name is recognizably Chinese. It got to the point where I'd respond in French to them and the Jehovah's witnesses that came to the door so that I could at least enjoy their confusion.<BR/><BR/>Depending on the context, it can also be seen as disrespectful here to speak in one language with a subset of a group when you know that you are excluding others from the conversion.<BR/><BR/>If I'm at dim sum with a mix of people, I expect to be addressed in English so that everyone in earshot understands. I'm not as annoyed in that context if there's an assumption that I speak Cantonese. But I want the table to be treated as a table with English as a common language first - and then if another language facilitates service and we've got speakers of the language, that's fine.<BR/><BR/>I don't care if we are not seen as "authentic". I'm at the restaurant because I'm showing appreciation for the food they serve. And what I care about is awareness of the staff to serve us in English as much as possible and our awareness that for a lot of the staff, English isn't necessarily their first language.<BR/><BR/>There's way too much diversity in this city to assume anything about anyone. And the question of authenticity isn't in my mind as much because you can get reasonable sushi at a restaurant run by Koreans, for example - and because I'm used to subverting expectations without even trying.<BR/><BR/>A co-worker recently told me that she had fun telling her friends about going to my birthday dinner last year. Gal with Chinese Jamaican background, partner's background is Estonian/British Isles, celebrating St. Patrick's Day at an Egyptian restaurant in the Greek area of town. That doesn't even include the diversity of the others I had dinner with.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17415554035453013542noreply@blogger.com